


Impossible Not to Notice

by klarolineagainnaturally



Category: The Originals (TV), The Vampire Diaries & Related Fandoms, The Vampire Diaries (TV), The Vampire Diaries - L. J. Smith
Genre: Drabble, F/M, Fluff, Klaroline, Klaus is fucking cute, The Originals - Freeform, just a tad, perhaps the fluffiest work i've ever done, rebekah is a little bit drunk lmao, sickly sweet, the vampire diaries - Freeform, tvd
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-10
Updated: 2020-05-10
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:28:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24115786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/klarolineagainnaturally/pseuds/klarolineagainnaturally
Summary: Drabble Request from brinnuh87: Caroline and Bekah are Best friends from like really young and Klaus is her brother and he’s liked her since they were young
Relationships: Caroline Forbes/Klaus Mikaelson
Comments: 16
Kudos: 117





	Impossible Not to Notice

**Author's Note:**

> If you like this, you will absolutely love the drabble by queencarolinemikaelson on tumblr titled ‘Rootless Tree’ as well as her other drabble ‘That One Time Caroline Forbes Lied to the Truth Circle’.
> 
> I thought I'd put a small spin on it so they're adults, but DAMN those feelings are there just the same.

Caroline just wanted to have a girl’s night: dance, get drunk and make out with some ripped college guy, who would hopefully think she was younger than twenty-five, before stumbling home with him. Was it a complicated ask?! But here she was in the middle of the bar, watching her best friend since middle school, Rebekah Mikaelson, trying not to vomit all over the bowl of complimentary wasabi peas.

“I think it’s safe to say this night was a bust,” Caroline lamented, glancing in her glass of wine before taking a sip.

“Uhuh,” was all that Rebekah replied, the gulp inside her throat disgustingly loud.

She cringed at the sound and mumbled into her drink, “At least you’re drunk enough to forget this fail of a night.”

Caroline had been on a downward turn lately. Freelancing wasn’t bringing in a lot of business unless she intended to give into the mess of ‘listicles’ and ad content. And then there was the subject of Tyler. She wouldn’t have been so enraged by his ghosting had he not posted some thirst traps on Instagram earlier that evening.

Taking in the atmosphere of the bar, it seemed like everyone was drunk but her. She was tipsy at best. Not enough shots could do the trick...for her; Rebekah was definitely reaping what she sowed after that last round.

She contemplated calling it a night when the familiar face of Rebekah’s older brother entering the bar caught her attention. He was surrounded by a bunch of corporate bozos each clothed in matching suits, him included.

A soft laugh left her at the sight. Klaus had become the very thing he despised. Yes, high school was long behind them, but she still remembered his diatribes against the ‘system’.

* * *

_ He caught her in the atrium, gluing cheap, gold stars to the prom banner. “Remind me, sweetheart, why you’re doing the decorations for someone else’s prom?” _

_ The younger girl rolled her eyes, her haughty expression on display. “Because,” she began but paused to glare at him, “I wanna be head of the prom committee next year and if I can show them that I’ve already put in the work, they’ll have no choice but to pick me.” _

_ “Trust me. They would be fools not to pick you.” _

_ Her cheeks flushed, but she carried on her work, pressing the stars with vigour. “So, who are you taking to prom?” _

_ He chuckled, his fingers pressing against the nape of his neck. “I’m afraid the girl I want to ask is a little unattainable.” _

_ “Angelina Jolie?” she said so obviously, her playful smile striking him as he approached her. _

_ Klaus sighed in equal humour, clutching his chest. “One day.” _

_ Caroline released an amused breath through her nose. He sat beside her, crossing his legs, and they fell into a comfortable silence. She paused to view her progress on the banner, thoughtfully pushing her lips out. _

_ “Can I help?” _

_ His voice floated through the air, unsettling the depths of her chest. “Um, sure.” Caroline shrugged and passed him an unopened bag of stars and a spare stick of glue. His fingers grazed the inside of her wrist as he accepted the plastic baggy, a sensation that sent a shock to her system.  _

_ She noticed him recoiling with a tensed face, eyes keeping to the banner on the floor. Figures. She was just his sister’s dumb friend, always bothering him for silly things and talking  _ **_way_ ** _ too much. _

_ “I don’t think I’m going to prom.” _

_ Caroline had become so in her head that his sudden statement prompted her to spill stars all over the banner. “What?!” she gasped and swivelled on her knees to face him. _

_ “I find the whole thing to be so...archaic,” he admitted, beginning to collect the stars she had dropped. “The systemic pressure to have a date and make that evening the highlight of your teens is ridiculous, just like the expectation to waste your life away in a cubicle for money. If you spot me wearing a suit, love, I give you the permission to shoot me.” _

_ Sometimes she thought Rebekah was right. Despite his youthful, good looks, inside beat the heart of an old man from eighteen-sixty-boring. _

_ She scoffed and folded her arms. “You can’t be serious! You’re saying that you would never  _ **_ever_ ** _ even consider going to prom?!” _

_ Klaus hummed for what felt like forever, his lips pushing out in such a way that it would be the future cause of every chewed pen lid in her case. “Maybe not never,” he conceded, his eyes alight with playful energy. “Only if the right girl asked.” _

* * *

“Ohhh Nik’s here!” Rebekah broke Caroline from her stupor, waving her arms about like a fish out of water. “Nik!!!”

It was funny how, when drunk, the American accent Rebekah had so adamantly refused came seeping through.

“Bekah, I think he’s busy with his friends,” she quashed the prospect of interaction with a quick interruption.

“You knowwww,” Rebekah drawled, leaning into her friend with a sly smile. “Nik was like in looooove with you!”

Her forehead creased in disbelief. “I think you’ve had too much to drink,” she laughed sympathetically; the hangover would not be pretty.

“No! He was!” Rebekah asserted loudly, slapping her hands against the table. Caroline was swift to grab her wine glass before she knocked it over. “He did all these sketches of youuu. He thought it was a secret but I found them!” she cheered at her own accomplishment and clapped.

Like that, she was sent through a loop. Everything she had thought in the past was so completely off base if what Rebekah was saying were to be true. No...it couldn’t be… Could it?

Rebekah’s eyes were barely open when she whined, “You’re so pretty, Ca-ro-line. It’s SO unfair…”

Caroline’s attention was far from Rebekah’s transition into the sad drunk, focusing solely on Klaus, who was laughing amongst his friends at the bar. Since coming to New York, she and Klaus had become reacquainted when he helped Rebekah move her things into their apartment. At the time, she wondered if he was flirting with her. His eyes would burn into her skin as he dispensed compliment after compliment, but she dismissed it as a trick of the mind.

From then on, he would visit them often on his way to meetings and she would ramble on in a flush of embarrassment due to his well-kept appearance while she lounged about in her pyjamas.

She sucked in a breath when he finally noticed her, but strained a smile. He made no bother to say a word to his friends before he came striding over. Her heart began beating like a freight train.

Klaus smiled warmly as he stopped at their table, his dimples on show. There was not much she could do to suppress the thrum in the pit of her stomach. Luckily for her, Rebekah’s drunken demeanour was distracting enough. “How much has she had to drink?”

“At least FIVE alcohols,” Rebekah was quick to answer, holding out her palm to display her fine mathematical skills.

Caroline expressed her embarrassment as she rested a palm on her forehead. “I  _ suggested  _ we go home—”

“HOME? But the party’s barely oooover!”

Caroline glanced at Rebekah, who began ripping apart a napkin. “—but clearly she has other ideas, and I don’t think I’m strong enough to take her if she gets rowdy.”

Klaus tilted his head, a sympathetic grimace appearing on his face. He took one look back at his co-workers. They were all engrossed in some gawking of the poor female bartender. With a click of his neck, he hoisted Rebekah off the seat and hooked his arm around her waist. “Come on.”

“Klaus, I don’t wanna ruin your night,” Caroline attempted to argue, but he had already begun to weave through the patrons. She quickly caught up once she snatched her and Rebekah’s purses from the table.

“I think I would much rather spend the evening with you than the tossers I work with,” he admitted with an easy tone, but it was anything  _ but  _ easy to her.

“You’re mean,” Rebekah contested and punched him in the shoulder.

Klaus barely flinched at the abuse, his grip tightening around her as they made their way to the exit. “Oddly, I’m okay with that, little sister.”

It wasn’t long until they were all sitting in the back of a New York City taxi, the driver’s music crackling through the vehicle. Rebekah sat in the middle, her head swaying as her body debated which person to drape over.

Caroline began tapping her fingers against her legs in the awkward silence between them. She cleared her throat, “Hey… When we were younger...did you…?” Abruptly, she intercepted her own words, “Never mind.”

“Did I what?”

“Nothing. It’s silly.”

“Caroline, you say a lot of things, none of which are silly.” His dimples came into view, though Rebekah’s body soon slumped against him to his dismay.

“Okay—” She sat up firmly, twisting to face him. “Rebekah seems to think when we were younger...you were in love with me?” she told him with an incredulous tone, her laugh taking over at his stunned expression. “I know! It’s crazy!”

“I was.”

The humorous air between them came to a standstill, her once grinning smile receding into bewildered parted lips. Caroline could only manage a single word, “What?” She analysed the way his eyes bore into her, not a flicker of his usual mischief present. “Y-you were?”

Klaus looked directly at her, nonchalantly correcting her, “I  _ am _ .”

Once again, she felt starved for air. The busy sounds of the radio were no longer her concern as she came to the sobering discovery. “Klaus.”

“You must have realised in all your ramblings, I never once interrupted you, never once took my eyes off you. You’re...full of light, Caroline. Why do you think your apartment is always ‘on the way’ to my destination?”

She bit down on her lip, the apples of her cheeks burning. “Because you’re a good brother?”

He chuckled and looked out the window momentarily before taking in her gaze. “High praise indeed.”

His relaxed manner spurred on a trail of thoughts. “But— Why didn’t you say anything? And you were always— I didn’t even think you really noticed me all that much?”

The smirk he presented was dangerous as she felt her heart skip a beat. “It would be impossible not to notice you, Caroline.”


End file.
